The Constitution and Government of Australia, 1788 to 1919

Between 1910 and 1919, William Pitt Cobbett, former Professor of Law and Dean of the Sydney Law School, wrote what would become his great opus on the Constitution and Government of Australia but the manuscript was never published. Its publication had been frustrated in the period following his death by the High Court’s judgment in the Engineers Case in 1920 and the new constitutional order it created. A century later, Professor Anne Twomey, has sensitively edited Cobbett’s original manuscript, taking care to preserve the integrity of his work.

The Federation Press, with the support of the Francis Forbes Society for Australian Legal History, will publish this important historical work which provides a detailed perspective of how the Constitution operated in the first two decades after federation.

"This manuscript represents one of the most poignant tragedies of life—the failure to fulfil a high aim because sickness and ultimately death stepped in to bar the way."— from the Preface by J Macmillan Brown, September 1922

CONTENTS

Part I: The Colonial History of Australia

1. The British Occupation and Subdivision of Australia 2. The Government of the Australian Colonies 3. The Foundations of the Commonwealth 4. The Constitution of the Commonwealth 5. The Commonwealth as a United Society

Part II: Imperial Factors in Australian Government

6. The Nature and Sources of Imperial Control 7. The Status and Powers of the Colonial Legislatures 8. Subjects of Imperial Control, and the Question of Imperial Consolidation

Part III: The Federal Government

9. The Office of the Governor-General 10. The Federal Parliament 11. The Federal Electoral System 12. The Powers of the Federal Parliament 13. Legislative Methods and Procedure 14. The Executive Government of the Commonwealth 15. The Federal Judicature

Part IV: The States and the Federal Territories

16. The Constitutional Position and Powers of the States 17. The Relation of the States and the Commonwealth 18. The Relations of the States Inter Se 19. The Federal Territories